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<br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> Stacy Higa <br /> Hawaii County Council <br /> 25 Aupuni Street '00 JUL 17 pM 4 11 <br /> Suite 209 <br /> Hilo, Hawaii 96720 C: <br /> I T <br /> !.Ouw <br /> July 13, 2006 <br /> Dear Mr. Higa, <br /> <br /> The Save Our Lands Citizens Committee has gathered over 9,000 petition signatures in favor of <br /> placing the question on the ballot in November to set aside 2% of the property taxes for Open Space <br /> and Natural Resource acquisition and remove the limit of $5 million that can be held in the Open <br /> Space Fund. This only amends the existing Open Space and Natural Resources Ordinance. <br /> <br /> Unfortunately, the County looked at the information with an eye to invalidating signatures rather than <br /> honoring voters' clear intent, creating an adversarial process: <br /> <br /> The County Clerk and Elections Officer invalidated signatures because residence addresses <br /> did not include st. ave. or hwy. The number and street address should be sufficient to verify <br /> that the person is a registered voter. It does not say in the charter that these suffices are <br /> required. <br /> The County Clerk refused to accept a PO Box as a "residence address" even though the <br /> County itself has voter PO Boxes on file and regularly uses these PO Boxes to send out voter <br /> registration cards to Hawai'i County citizens. <br /> Signatures were invalidated because they did not include the year-'06. The year was clearly <br /> implied by the start of the Petition Initiative Drive and the date of the Notary signature on the <br /> back of the Petitions. <br /> <br /> I ask the Council to honor over 9,000 people who have signed this petition. Citizens have been <br /> frustrated by conflicting instructions from the County as to the timelines and the stringent application <br /> of the arbitrary and ambiguous criteria that the County has imposed on this process. I ask the County <br /> to include signatures of voters that: <br /> 1- forgot to write the st. ave. or highway suffix as part of their residence addresses <br /> 2- forgot to put the year 2006 in the date column. <br /> Both of these criteria are clearly implied. I believe that the County should be using petition <br /> information to qualify signatures not looking for insignificant reasons to disqualify voter's signatures. <br /> Please vote favoring the resolution that will put the question on the November 2006 Ballot and let <br /> Hawaii County voters decide to modify the existing Open Space and Natural Resources Ordinance. <br /> <br /> Sincerely, e <br /> <br /> <br /> Constance Clime <br /> 430 W Kawili Street Apt. 17A p <br /> Hilo, Hawaii COMM. No. ~•I`iO <br /> Ref. To: ~N CAVJAU <br /> Ref. bate JUL 19 2006 <br />